By Robert L. Brenna Jr.
The Daily Record Newswire
I remember a great quote from Abraham Lincoln.
During the Civil War, a soldier said, “Let us pray that God is on our side.”
Lincoln responded by saying, “Let us pray that we are on God’s side.”
After starting this week’s column, I saw two sporting events reference God. One was a football team that said the “Hail Mary” together prior to going out onto the field, and another was watching a baseball player make the sign of the cross before he went to bat.
Now, I’m not really sure, but if God is, in fact, our Father — or Mother? — then I have to believe we cumulatively are the worst children anyone could hope for. I can’t help but wonder why thousands of people seem to believe that God needs a touchdown in a particular moment or a home run for anybody. Unconditional love doesn’t necessarily mean that you side with one particular team or player.
I wonder how God feels about his children’s roadside bombs, the Beltway sniper, fanatics who use his name in vain to boost their own wealth, status, political clout or merely just to stroke their own egos.
As it winds up, it appears I may be the only person to whom God is not personally talking. That comes as a shock to me, since I started praying when I was very young. In fact, I can’t even remember when I first started praying.
At first, I was just jealous of Glenn Beck. Here’s a guy who has made it big on the radio in a matter of a few years, and has become a gazillionaire. He can have tea with virtually anybody he wants to anywhere in the good old U.S. of A. For all I know, he can have a tea party with anyone in the world!
I know it used to be said that when you talk to God, it is prayer, but that when God talks to you it is schizophrenia. Seeing some of Glenn Beck’s rants, I get the feeling that, in his case, the latter is more true. I know that, in the old days, people in the Bible got chances to speak with God all the time. I’m not sure how they got his number, but they certainly had some kind of direct communication that I’ve never been able to establish.
It was bad enough watching a fellow radio host (whose penchant for truth was lost years ago) zoom by me and become a gazillionaire, but those of you who have read my column in the past may remember how much I love the Lincoln Memorial. He had to choose the Lincoln Memorial! That really ticked me off! Maybe someone should explain to him that Lincoln was more concerned with being in allegiance with God’s plan than gaining an advantage over others by invoking His name.
Earlier this week on the news, I learned that one job applicant listed God as a reference on his resume, but apparently he was unable to provide the phone number necessary to double check the reference. Too bad! Could’ve been a real good way to get a job.
Then, the next thing I know, somebody else gets to talk to God. Not Moses or Abraham (the other Abraham), only some guy with a congregation of 50 people in Florida who decided to have a little bonfire.
Apparently within days, God called him, too. I’m really starting to feel left out. Pastor Terry Jones threatens to have a book burning, and all of a sudden he’s got a direct line to heaven. Don’t doubt it. He told us of his conversations.
It seems horribly unfair, but I don’t have 50 friends who want to burn books with me. I wonder if anybody has stopped to consider the fact that, although many would fight to the death for the rights guaranteed to us by the Constitution, and especially the Bill of Rights, every time we have the right to do something due to our day-to- day freedom, it doesn’t necessarily preclude the use of our brain to decide whether carrying out a permissible act is the right thing to do.
It’s odd that most of the evil I see on the planet is being carried out in one form or another in the name of God.
For God’s sake, cut it out!
Robert L. Brenna Jr. is a partner in the Rochester, NY, law firm of Brenna, Brenna & Boyce PLLC, which his father founded.
